There are a few norms that constrain the behaviour of newsgathering, one of which is to at least try, for any given story, to get the perspective of all parties involved. Many company PR teams abuse this constraint by providing journalists with spin or misinformation, which a reporter may or may not infuse with the necessary scepticism. Amazon, it seems, is no longer willing to take that chance.
The ecommerce giant ” a source of labour strife in the Before Times, and more recently an exemplar of rapacious greed’s incompatibility with a pandemic’s best practices ” has taken to producing its own promotional segment, complete with narration and interviews, with the intention to have it run unedited during regular news coverage.
It’s desperate. It’s embarrassing. You can watch the full segment here if you really want, or just gaze upon this eerie montage ” courtesy of our former colleague Tim Burke ” of 11 different local news stations parroting the exact talking points Amazon wrote about itself.
The site lead who appears in the Amazon-made package, Marty Kuhl, health officials. Gizmodo’s inquiry this morning to determine the accurate exposure count at BFI4 was similarly unanswered.)
Likewise, the spin segment ” which the above stations shamefully pushed to their audiences seemingly without caveat ” claims Amazon has implemented “more than 150 new health and safety measures.” The company has not specified, to Gizmodo or elsewhere, what those measures are exactly, but workers continue to report social distancing and cleaning procedures inside many warehouses remain inadequate.
Amazon also declined to comment on the record as to whether Kuhl, or Stanaleen Greenman, another employee featured in the video, were in any way compensated for their appearances.
At a minimum, this sort of thing is lazy and emblematic of the slow gutting and neutering of local news across the country; at worst, it’s the unethical airing of company propaganda to an audience that assumes the footage was captured by unbiased reporters from local stations. According to Courier, which compiled the clips above, one of these stations even claimed to be unaware the segment was produced by Amazon.
So far the only publishable communication we’ve received from Amazon in regards to this bizarre video was one of the company’s ubiquitous invitations to tour its warehouse facilities ” an option which is no longer available to the lay public but which apparently is still possible for journalists who are inclined to question its pandemic response measures.